Public Willingness to Pay for Continuous and Probabilistic Hazard Information

Wesley Wehde,Hank Jenkins-Smith,Joseph T Ripberger,Benjamin A Jones,Jinan N Allan,Carol L Silva

doi:10.1061/(asce)nh.1527-6996.0000444

Abstract

AbstractInvestments in new weather forecasting technologies and communication products can be costly and serve the ultimate purpose of protecting life and property. The Forecasting a Continuum of E...

Highlights

Since the mid-2000s, the National Weather Service (NWS) has dedicated significant resources to developing better methods for incorporating and communicating uncertainty into their weather and climate forecasts and products
The Forecasting a Continuum of Environmental Threats (FACETs) paradigm seeks to integrate these various efforts into an overall framework for forecasting that incorporates probabilistic hazard information (PHI) that is continuously updated over time and geography with the current system of intermittent, deterministic products
Examination of covariates that are more specific to the good in question suggests that experiences and perceptions of tornadoes and weather information are strongly related to willingness to pay (WTP) for an app that provides probabilistic hazard information

Summary

Introduction

Since the mid-2000s, the National Weather Service (NWS) has dedicated significant resources to developing better methods for incorporating and communicating uncertainty into their weather and climate forecasts and products. Under the Forecasting a Continuum of Environmental Threats (FACETs) paradigm, the National Severe Storms Laboratory (NSSL) and NWS have developed forecast products that incorporate probabilistic hazard information (PHI) into the current deterministic, binary system for severe weather warnings. Along with the development of these products, the National Research Council recommended investments in social, behavioral, and economic research that would examine how the public interprets probabilistic information and how to improve communication thereof (NRC 2006, 2012). The study finds a mean WTP of $7.53 per average US person, which, when aggregated across relevant US populations, is between $901 million and $1.56 billion

Background

Findings

Conclusions